Spin offish-Does your area not follow some big WB etiquette rules

Hi bees, this is sort of a spin off from what didn’t you know before WB.

But what big WB etiquitte rules does your area or social circle not usually follow?

Here’s mine:

1.) Cash bar – I go to 4-5 weddings every year (I’ve got a huge extended family) and I’ve NEVER been to one without a cash bar! And no one even blinks an eye at it. It’s probably because drinks are so crazy expensive around here, and people tend to drink alot. A beer can be $6.75 and receptions usually go until about 2am, so you can only imagine what the bar budget would have to be!

2.) Gap between ceremony and reception – Again, every wedding I’ve ever been to have a huge gap between the two and no one blinks an eye at it. Ceremony is usually around 2pm and reception is around 6 or 7 pm. But I always enjoy it because usually everyone gets together at one house and just hangs around and it’s always a good time!

3.) Bridal showers – It seems like on the WB the bridal party throws the shower, but around here it tends to be the MOB.

I live on Long Island and weddings all seem to be very similar here. (Fun, but all similar). Open bar and cover your plate cash gifts are the norm. It’s a very Catholic area so the gap is common. It’s not unheard of to skip the ceremony bc of this either.

Getting accessories for bridesmaids as part of the wedding gift is acceptable. You don’t need to have the worlds most perfect gift for your wedding party. I have never felt slighted because of this, and I’m sure my girls will not either.

MOB throwing a shower is common place. I think this was a rule when girls got married at 18-19, but now that most of us are semi or completely independent prior to marriage, I don’t think this is a big deal.

“Not registering = you want money”, or “wedding gifts are usually money” … nope, wedding gifts are sometimes off the registry and sometimes some random thing that someone thinks you should have, and occasionally money. Not registering increases the likelihood of the second.

1. Being obvious about a B and C list. “Oh, I know this invite is late, but some people RSVP’ed ‘No’ hence would you like to come in their place?” I cringe post-WB, but it really isn’t frowned upon here.

2. Cash bars. In my DH’s area, there is no such thing as a cash bar, but in my area there are only cash bars. I suspect it’s b/c in order to buy a house, go to school, be raised in his area, it costs a lot of money, whereas my area is more lower middle-class.

3. Asking for cash/monetary gift in lieu of boxed gifts. I don’t know for sure if it’s frowned upon here, but I see it so often in my area that I’m guessing it’s almost acceptable now. :/

Yeah, the cash bar thing is weird. I’ve been to many, many weddings in Toronto and surrounding area as a musician and I think maybe 2 of them had cash bars. It’s usually expected that alcohol is provided at no charge to guests. In fact, most catered events I’ve been to have had open bars. It must be a thing here.

Some areas in Canada don’t do registries or anything like that at all, like in Quebec. My mom told me this as she was married there.

There is usually never much of a gap either, it’s generally ceremony > photos > reception with no spare time between each thing.

The following goes for my social circle, not necessarily the entire UK. But these are the main ones:

1) Cash bars. These are very much the norm where I live, due mainly to the cost of drinks (think around 8 USD a pint, and 9 USD for a 175ml glass of wine) and the length of our weddings (ours will be around 14 hours from start to finish). Money behind the bar would be considered generous; an open bar extremely generous and pretty uncommon unless you move in wealthy circles. We’re spending a whopping 7k (USD) on drinks; and this doesn’t stretch to an open bar even though we don’t have a large guest list.

2) Bridal showers. Among my friends and family these would be considered tacky with a capital T and just would not be done.

3) Putting registry information in the invitation. This is pretty common here and most guests expect it (again among my friends and family). I really didn’t want to include it but it’s easier to just do it.

4) Inviting extra people to the evening reception. A typical wedding here has kind of 3 distinct parts: the ceremony; the meal (wedding breakfast); and the evening party/reception. Usually, some guests (colleagues or more distant family) might only be invited to the evening, and not to the ceremony and meal. This is not considered at all rude and is very common.

5) Plus ones. It is not generally considered necessary to give everyone a plus one, particularly when it comes to evening guests. For example, we have invited some of my colleagues, but are not inviting their partners. This is not considered rude, as they know each other and would not expect their partners, who we haven’t met, to be invited.

6) Bridesmaids dresses. Where I live, the couple almost always pays. The ONLY way it would be considered OK for the bridesmaids to pay would be if they are asked to wear something they already own. The same goes with hair and make-up: if the couple want a certain look, they pay. The same goes for the groomsmen, and the couple still buy gifts as a thank you for being part of the wedding.

@MrsNewDay: Oh yes, I forgot about the B list! Thats very much a thing around here too. I’ve very obviously been on the B list before, and I wasn’t offended in the least. I mean, theres limits to the guest count and as a friend I know the family has to come first. Everyone else understands that around here as well.

The biggest I can think of is that now, it’s quite common that guests are required to pay for their meals. It’s not the same as ”cover your plate” which is also common. Cover your plate is a mentality among guest to help the couple pay for the reception and want to offer a substantial cash gift (since we do not register here), while what I’m talking about is literally couples sending a request on their invites, saying how much the meal costs and if the guest want to attend they’ll have to send a cheque. To be honest, it’s so common in my area for guests to pay to attend the reception, that I didn’t know that ”free meals” existed before joining wedding boards ! Literally, I thought it was only in movies that people registered, paid everything for their guests, etc. It’s not the norm here, and it’s certainly not the norm in my family. My parents got married 3 decades ago and it was the norm in their social circle to have their guests pay, I don’t know, 30$ to cover the caterer’s fees.

Other than that, things that I know are done in weddings around here and nobody would be offended : cash bars, very common. Dollar dances, very common. Not having +1s, very common, childfree weddings (actually recommanded by wedding experts), not having a shower (considered gift-grabby). However, it is expected to have a bachelorette party and usually the bride’s friends will dress her up, bring her to different places where she will have to succeed challenges or play games in order to win money for her wedding.

Inviting people to different parts of the wedding is also common. Usually you invite your close friends and family to the wedding ceremony and reception, then for the dance (around 9pm) you can invite people you’re not that close too, but you’d like to party with : ex.: your coworkers, your cousins, your childhood friends, etc. And no, people are not offended, they’re happy to be invited and they’re ready to party !

To word my opinion as delicately as possible, I think there is some *entitlement* (probably not the best word, expectations ?) going on with etiquette, as to how guests expect to be treated, and it’s not the same mentality here. Overall, I think etiquette-weddings are really concerned about pleasing the guests, while weddings around here are mainly focussed around pleasing the newlyweds (not meaning that the guests are not treated well, but the difference of perspective obviously affects how *etiquette* is perceived and done, and allows things to be acceptable where it absolutely would be considered rude elsewhere, and vice-versa).